Clip device on a shuttle of a loom

ABSTRACT

The invention relates to a clip device on a shuttle of a loom for retaining the head of weft pirns. The clip device has a clamping jaw at each lateral wall of the shuttle and inserted between each clamping jaw and its associated lateral wall is a resilient material for permitting movement of the clamping jaws towards and away from the lateral wall.

United States/Patent [1 91 Meier Dec. 10, 1974 CLIP DEVICE ON A SHUTTLE OF A LOOM [75] n en Franz Meier, Ruti/Zurich,

Switzerland [73] Assignee: Ruti Machinery Works Ltd.,

formerly Ca'sper Honegger, Ruti/Zurich, Switzerland 22 Filed: Jan. 22, 1973 211 Appl. No.: 325,138

[30] Foreign Application Priority Data Jan. 24, 1972 Switzerland 969/72 [52] US. Cl. 139/207 [51] Int. Cl. D03j 5/16 [58] Field of Search 139/207, 206

[56] References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 907,476 12/1908 Draper 139/207 2,138,221 11/1938 Turner 139/207 3,048,197 8/1962 Fink 3,233,635 2/1966 Klocker et al. 3,316,942 5/1967 Thatcher 139/207 FOREIGN PATENTS OR APPLICATIONS 381,177 10/1964 Switzerland 139/207 567,192 10/1958 Belgium Primary Examiner-James Kee Chi Attorney, Agent, or FirmDonald D. Denton [57] ABSTRACT The invention relates to a clip device on a shuttle of a loom for retaining the head of weft pirns. The clip device has a clamping jaw at each lateral wall of the shuttle and inserted between each clamping jaw and its associated lateral wall is a resilient material for per mitting movement of the clamping jaws towards and away from the lateral wall.

7 Claims, 3 Drawing Figures CLIP DEVICE ON A SHUTTLE OF A LOOM BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION In conventional shuttles, the head of the weft pirn is retained by two holding elements which are resiliently biased relative to each other. The said elements consist, in many shuttles, of two metal jaws resiliently connected together through the agency of a U-shaped metal bow. For retaining a weft pirn, the pirn head is pressed between the two metal jaws. The two metal jaws are pressed together by the metal bow, so that the pim head is firmly seated. In this type of shuttle, there are formed in the inner sides of the metal jaws vertically extending grooves into which metal rings provided on the pim head pass when the pirn is held by the metal jaws. It is furthermore known to enhance the elasticity of the metal jaws with the aid of a rubber band.

This mode of retaining a pim has various disadvantages. Since it has metal elements, it is relatively heavy. There is a risk of rupture of the metal jaws and the metal bow. The screw serving for securing the pirn retaining arrangement and the varying loading of the U shaped metal bow bearing closely against the shuttle body involve a danger of rupture and fissuring of the shuttle body. There is also a possibility that the abovementioned metal rings may, on changing a pirn, not pass into the associated grooves but into grooves adjacent thereto. If this happens, the pim is falsely positioned in the axial direction. The spring tensioning force on the metal jaws varies from spring to spring, so that the latter must be selected to be too large on the average, so as to be sufficiently strong in every case. At the same time, the transfer hammer for automatic spool changing must be designed to be correspondingly robust.

The closest known prior art in connection with the invention presented in this application for Letters Patent is in German Offenlegung No. 1,785,401 and Switzerland 375,679.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The above disadvantages are overcome by the present invention which is characterized in that, at each lateral wall, a resilient material is inserted between the said lateral wall and the clamping jaw associated with it and is secured to the lateral wall and to the clamping jaw and carries the clamping jaw.

The invention will now be discussed in greater detail with reference to two examples of embodiment and drawings, in which:

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS FIG. 1 shows a plan view of an end portion of a shuttle;

FIG. 2 shows a cross-section through the shuttle of FIG. 1, taken along the line IIII; and

FIG. 3 shows a cross-section similar to that of FIG. 2 of another embodiment of the clamping device of this invention.

DESCRIPTION OF PREFERRED EMBODIMENT The shuttle 11 illustrated in FIG. 1 has a shuttle tip 12. Disposed in the cavity defined by shuttle 1 1 are two clamping jaws 13 which may be made from a plasticlike material. The clamping jaws are secured to a resil' ient material 14 that is positioned in recesses within the cavity portion of the shuttle body so that the clamping jaws are supported by the resilient material. Each of the resilient material pieces 14 is rectangular and is secured to one of the lateral walls 15 of the shuttle 11. Preferably, the material pieces 14, one for each jaw, are glued to the bottom of the recess at their broad sides designated 16. From the lateral walls 15, guiding walls 17 constituting guideways for the clamping jaws extend towards the inner space of the shuttle 11 in the recess. The clamping jaws 13 are laterally displaceable in the said guiding walls 17 and during their movement are guided parallel to themselves. They are bent-over at their end 18 bearing against the shuttle tip 12 and the bent-over ends bear, in a recess formed in the shuttle body, against the latter. Due to the gluing of the material pieces 14, the clamping device is accurately positioned in the longitudinal direction of the shuttle (see FIGS. 1 and 2).

If a weft pim is pressed with its pirn head between the clamping jaws 13, then the clamping jaws are pressed apart by the yielding of the resilient material 14, to permit the pim head to pass between the upper constrictions of the jaws 13. Normally, this procedure takes place during automatic pim changing whereby, as is known, with the pressing-in of a fresh pirn, a pim already disposed between the clamping jaws 13 is pressed out. Due to the pirns being disposed of, the lower constricted portions of the clamping jaws 13 are also pressed apart. When the clamping jaws 13 are being pressed apart, the latter are guided parallel to themselves by the guideways 17. Since the ends 18 of the clamping jaws 13 are disposed in the recesses formed in the shuttle body and are also guided therein, the parallel guiding of the clamping jaws 13 is substantially promoted thereby during pim changing.

The example of a further embodiment of the invention is shown according to FIG. 3 which is similar to the one shown in FIGS. 1 and 2. Here again, there are shown the two lateral walls 15 of the shuttle, whereof guiding walls 17 constituting guideways extend towards the inner space of the shuttle. The rectangular resilient material pieces 14 are again glued or otherwise fastened at the broad sides 16, on the one hand each with a lateral wall 15 of the shuttle, and on the other hand each with a lateral wall of a clamping jaw 13, so that each material piece 14 resiliently carries a clamping jaw 13.

The example of embodiment shown in FIG. 3 differs from that of FIGS. 1 and 2 only in that the guideways guide the clamping jaws 13 only indirectly, that is via the resilient material pieces 14. With this arrangement, a small intermediate space may be provided between the guiding faces 17 and the clamping jaws 13.

It is of course also possible to guide both the resilient material pieces 14 and also the clamping jaws 13 by means of the guideways 17. With regard to the selection of material, an advantageous combination (offered purely by way of example) consists in that as the resilient material 14 a foamed material, for example polyurethane foam material or cellular rubber, is employed.

material pieces 14 has a cross-sectional shape of a rectangle. However, it is also possible to provide, instead of a single rectangular piece of material, a plurality of separate pieces of resilient material. It will be appreciated that any plastic-like or rubber-like resilient material may be used that will provide the necessary give or resilience, and the jaws may be madeof any suitable plastic-like material that will firmly hold the pirns therebetween when biased by the resilient material.

It will be appreciated that various changes and modifications may be made within the skill of the art without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention illustrated and described herein.

What is claimed is:

1. A clamping device on a shuttle for retaining the pim head of weft pirns, the device having a set of clamping jaws adjacent to lateral walls of the shuttle, said clamping jaws being separate and independent from each other, a resilient supporting material being positioned between each clamping jaw and its adjacent lateral wall for permitting resilient movement of the clamping jaws towards the lateral walls and away therefrom, said resilient supporting material between each clamping jaw and its adjacent lateral wall being secured both to the lateral wall and tothe clamping jaw, to support and hold the clamping jaws attached by said resilient supporting material.

2. The clamping device according to claim 1 wherein each lateral wall defines a guideway having a guideway wall therein for guiding each of the clamping jaws parallel to themselves during their resilient movement to- 4. The clamping device according to claim 2 in which I the resilient supporting material extends along the guideway walls constituting the guideway, and bears thereagainst.

5. The clamping device according to claim 2 in which each of the clamping jaws has, at its end located towards the shuttle tip, a bent-over portion which is disposed in a recess formed in the shuttle body and is guided thereby, while bearing against the said recess.

6. The clamping device according to claim 1 in which the resilient supporting material has a cross-section that is rectangular in shape and is secured at one side thereof to a lateral wall and at the opposite side thereof in a recess formed in a clamping jaw.

7. The clamping device according to claim 1 in which the resilient supporting material consists of polyurethane foam material and the clamping jaws are formed from polyethylene. 

1. A clamping device on a shuttle for retaining the pirn head of weft pirns, the device having a set of clamping jaws adjacent to lateral walls of the shuttle, said clamping jaws being separate and independent from each other, a resilient supporting material being positioned between each clamping jaw and its adjacent lateral wall for permitting resilient movement of the clamping jaws towards the lateral walls and away therefrom, said resilient supporting material between each clamping jaw and its adjacent lateral wall being secured both to the lateral wall and to the clamping jaw, to support and hold the clamping jaws attached by said resilient supporting material.
 2. The clamping device according to claim 1 wherein each lateral wall defines a guideway having a guideway wall therein for guiding each of the clamping jaws parallel to themselves during their resilient movement towards the lateral walls and away therefrom.
 3. The clamping device according to claim 2 in which each clamping jaw extends at least partially along the guideway walls.
 4. The clamping device according to claim 2 in which the resilient supporting material extends along the guideway walls constituting the guideway, and bears thereagainst.
 5. The clamping device according to claim 2 in which each of the clamping jaws has, at its end located towards the shuttle tip, a bent-over portion which is disposed in a recess formed in the shuttle body and is guided thereby, while bearing against the said recess.
 6. The clamping device according to claim 1 in which the resilient supporting material has a cross-section that is rectangular in shape and is secured at one side thereof to a lateral wall and at the opposite side thereof in a recess formed in a clamping jaw.
 7. The clamping device according to claim 1 in which the resilient supporting material consists of polyurethane foam material and the clamping jaws are formed from polyethylene. 